Guide to iPhone and iPad settings: how to use all the iOS Settings UPDATED

Cliff Joseph |
Aug. 20, 2015

Like System Preferences on a Mac , Settings on your iPhone or iPad offers access to tools for adjusting screen brightness, setting up a password, configuring your WiFi, and more. But in addition you will also find options for handling phone calls and mobile broadband, as well as many additional security features that protect your personal files, photos and other information.

Letting iPhone apps use your location

It's good that you can turn of location services if you want to. But, of course, apps such as Maps or Weather do need to know your location in order to work properly, so you also have the ability to control location services for each app individually. Any app that tries to use your location info is listed in the Location Services panel, and if you tap on the name of an app you'll see two straightforward options. The 'Never' option simply blocks the app from using location services at all. The other option is 'While Using the App' - which only allows the app to check your location when you actually have the app running on screen. I chose the BBC Weather app for this example, but the privacy controls are the same for all the other apps that may want to use location services.

Making Changes to Settings on iPhone and iPad

One handy option here is the entry marked 'Don't Allow Changes'. You can set up location services for your main apps - for me it's the BBC Weather and Maps - and then tap 'Don't Allow Changes'. This locks the settings for those apps so that they work the way you want, but automatically blocks any new apps that you might download from having access to location services. If you ever change your mind you can just tap 'Allow Changes' to change the location settings for all your apps once more.

Keyboard Control settings on iPhone and iPad

One of the big changes introduced in iOS 8 was the ability to use third-party keyboards as well as the standard on-screen keyboard that is built into iOS 8. When you download a new keyboard from the iTunes Store it will appear on the Home screen of your iPhone or iPad just like any other app. However, you also need to go into Settings in order to activate each keyboard that you want to use.

Go into Keyboard settings and then tap Keyboards at the top of the screen. You'll see the standard iOS English keyboard listed, along with the Emoji keyboard that displays smiley faces and other symbols. Beneath those is the option to 'Add New Keyboard'. Tap on this and you'll see whatever keyboard apps you have installed. We've downloaded two new keyboards - Fleksy and Swype - that we want to try out.

Tap the name of the keyboard and you'll be asked if you want to give the keyboard 'full access'. Some people worry about this, as it means that the keyboard app could record everything you type and send it off to the developer of the app. But any app that did this wouldn't sell very well, so developers generally don't abuse the access that you grant them.